<< During a recent thread I noticed several references to “desire” as something distasteful or kind of unspiritual. This puzzled me just a bit. I have always considered attraction to be a basic principle of the universe, hady for things like keeping your future food within reach. Desire then occurs when you decide you really want the thing you are attracted to. >>

I’m not exactly sure which posting your referring to, but the way I see the concept of desire is three fold:

Desire, Mundane: In my book not really desire, it deals with the feelings of needing to do a number of administrative actions: eating, mailing that letter, sleeping, things involved generally with ones life style. In magick, many would say, these actions should take on a spiritual meaning in the doer to make them Willed actions. This is the idea of putting all that one is and has into the Great Work.

Desire, Lustful: This is commonly recognized by many (including all those people whose teachings I respect) to be absolutely antagonistic to ones spirituality. Lustful desire is the tumultuous type of desire that perpetuates many personal illusions dealing with what one thinks their Will is. In following lust instead of True Will, much pain is caused and inspires one to further, but more pessimistic and deceptive, lust.

Desire, True Will: Again I think this is not really desire. I would place desire closer to #2. But the True Will is that course in existence which is what one is truly designed for (not in the sense that most people would define as fate). When lusts are quieted and intuition is followed, this Will often manifests, in my experience, as finding an act, system, thought, view, idea, profession, etc, that fills a gaping hole whose existence one had felt but never before realized was there. The “genius” is usually freed by following the True Will. And one could then find themselves doing something they had no experience in (nor an ability in, in similar areas) with a skill and grace rarely seen amongst the best of its most enced amateurs.

Needless to say, finding and following one’s True Will comprises much of the spiritual path and thus anything that keeps one from so doing is antagonistic to spirituality. Thus, if one defines desire closer to that of lust, then indeed, desire is “something distasteful or kind of [kind of? more like very!] unspiritual”.